Mexican Street Corn Chicken Rice Bowl

If you’re a fan of Mexican street corn, then you’re going to want to try this recipe. You’re going to love it, I promise, because my family and I sure did. So to start off with, I’m going to make a marinade for chicken thighs.

Why You’ll Love This

You’re going to love it, I promise, because my family and I sure did. I really love chicken thighs. They’re my favorite. Plus they’re really good grilled. This, I mean, this is really good. This really kind of impressed me. I’m going to definitely make this again. 10 out of 10. It was good. It was great.

Ingredients

Olive oil
Garlic (couple teaspoons, couple cubes)
Soy sauce
Worcestershire sauce
Lemon zest
A whole lemon juice
Salt
Pepper
4 chicken thighs (or chicken breast)
Jasmine rice
Quinoa
A bag of frozen white corn (or 4 ears of corn, or canned corn)
Tahini
Sumac
Smoked paprika
Cumin
Black beans
1/3 cup Mayonnaise
Sour cream (optional)
Lime zest
Lime juice
Chili powder (a little bit)
Feta cheese
Queso fresco
Cilantro
Red onion

Instructions

Make a marinade for chicken thighs with olive oil, a couple teaspoons of garlic, soy sauce, Worcestershire sauce, lemon zest, a whole lemon juice, salt, and pepper.
Add four chicken thighs to the marinade.
Cover the chicken with plastic wrap and put it in the fridge for 45 minutes to an hour.
Cook jasmine rice (and some quinoa for my husband).
Saute a bag of frozen white corn in a pan with a little olive oil, some more garlic, salt, pepper, tahini, sumac, smoked paprika, and cumin, aiming to get some charred bits.
Make some black beans in a smaller pan.
For the corn salad, combine 1/3 cup mayo, an optional little bit of sour cream, another couple defrosted garlic cubes (microwaved for 30 seconds), lime zest, and the juice from a lime.
Add some paprika and a little bit of chili powder to the mayo mixture.
Whisk to incorporate the garlic and everything.
Crumble up some feta cheese and queso fresco.
Add the crumbled feta cheese and queso fresco into the warm corn.
Grill the chicken thighs on high heat for 3-4 minutes per side.
Cut up some cilantro and some red onion.
Add the cilantro and red onion into the bowl with the corn and the mayo mixture.
Cut up the cooked chicken.
To dish up: Serve the rice, chicken thighs, a pile of black beans, a little bit more queso fresco on top, and a little cilantro.

Cooking Tips

Being careful not to go too far down because we don’t want to get the bitter white pith when zesting a lemon or lime.
I use this strainer to catch all the seeds. We don’t want that in our marinade.
You can use chicken breast if you want. I prefer to use chicken thighs tonight.
If you use canned corn, really, really drain it well. Make sure you get enough of that water off as you can. We don’t want watery corn here.
If garlic is going bad too fast, you could process it and freeze it in little ice cube trays. And you have it ready for you anytime you need garlic.
It’s easy to overdo chili powder, but just a little bit here. You can measure out everything if you want. I’m not, I just like to eyeball it.
If you ever get a big container of feta cheese at , fun fact, you can freeze the whole thing and just kind of break off what you need as you go. So I’m just saying it freezes well.
Queso fresco doesn’t melt down really well. It’s not a melting cheese per se, but it’s a really nice creamy, mild cheese to add into your Mexican dishes.

Serving Suggestions

You can put any toppings you want on this rice bowl, by the way. You could use shrimp also, if you wanted, instead of the chicken, that would be really good too.

So here comes the chicken thighs. I’m going to put a little pile of black beans and I’m going to put a little bit more queso fresco on top and a little cilantro. And that is going to be our dinner tonight. And it was really good. I’m still full and I loved it. I’m going to make it again. So that’s it. Look at this. See, it’s not real gorgeous, but darn, it’s good.